Welcome to Ilvermorny

This is Atop Mount Greylock, a modern day Ilvermorny rpg. At Greylock, we ignore the existence of the characters of Harry Potter and create all original characters so that we can be free to play in the world created by our Queen, JKR.

Paras’s holiday hadn’t been entirely unpleasant, and he’d found that he had just enough down-time to prepare syllabi for his classes for the second semester, something he hadn’t bothered with for the first semester and had then regretted. Between grading papers, preparing potions, and mentoring a few select students, Paras’s so-called “free time” after classes had been quickly consumed, and the normally-organized man had spent his first semester throwing lessons together, slap-shod, at the last minute.

It was not a mistake he would make a second time.

They had at this point had two lessons in the Spring semester. In their first, Paras had handed out the shiny new Spring Semester Syllabus, gone over it with his students, and done a review of the previous semester’s safety lessons. He had also gone over their safety exam, which they would be required to pass in order to be allowed to brew that semester.

Today’s course plan was a little more hands-on and, Paras hoped, a little more engaging. He’s instructed the students, both verbally and via syllabus, to dress in clothes that could get dirty. For his own part, he was prepared to use cleaning spells liberally, but it would--hopefully--be worth the mess. His last lesson with the beginning students the semester before had been enough to teach him that they learned better when they were having fun with the lesson--something his sister, Cadence, had suggested would be true and which he had been annoyed to learn she was correct about. And so he would attempt to engage them as he teached them. His lesson plans couldn’t all be fun and games, but he hoped that if he did one or two fun lessons per unit, they’d pay attention better during the lessons in between.

He’d cleared his classroom for this lesson, leaving only the tables and chairs behind. None of them were inhabitable, nor was Paras trying to trick them about it. The tables were lined up along the perimeter of the classroom, while the chairs had been scattered around the middle of the room, leaving a space at the very front of the room. For now, cloths hid the contents of the tables and chairs from view, though the cloths had been charmed to hover just enough that they did not ruin the things underneath. The door was open to his office, which was right next to his classroom, and a single drawer in his desk had been opened.

On the chalkboard he had written Please place your homework in the top left drawer of my desk, leave the rest of your things in my office, and take a seat on the floor in front of my desk.

He, as always, was sitting on top of his desk. Like everything else, it had been cleared for the lesson, though he had not made it into a work station like everything else. He waited for his students to come in, drop their things, and settle themselves. When he was sure they all had, he closed and locked the door to his office so that no one would be getting into mischief with other students’ things during the course of the lesson.

”Today we start our unit on pastes,” Paras told the students, starting his lecture, as always, without preamble. ”When most of us think of potions we think of liquids. Pastes are a subcategory of potion identifiable by their viscous consistency--they’re thicker and usually hold together better than a real liquid would. We use pastes for all sorts of things. You each wrote essays on pastes for homework, so hopefully you have an idea of the sorts of things they can be used for.

”Next week we’ll have a more traditional lecture on pastes. Today, we’re going to have a little bit of fun. Before we start, however, I will point out a few things. The first is that class will be letting out a little bit early today. For those of you who failed your safety exam last week, you may try again after class. Additionally, it should give all of you enough time to go back to your common rooms and change into uniforms before your next class. That said, I will not be taking credit for any of you going to your next class improperly clothed or arriving late.”

”One of the key duties of a potions master is to observe potions. So today we are doing a hands-on observation of various pastes.

He waved his wand, and the cloths disappeared, leaving the contents of the tables and chairs visible.

”On the tables behind you, you will find numerous pastes for your inspection. There is an invisible ward around the perimeter, so if you choose to hang out by the tables, you should be free of any...splatter… from the center of the room. You are free to do whatever you like with the substances on the tables as long as you do not bring it into the center of the room and you do not aim it at another classmate.

“In the center of the room we have thinner pastes. If you choose, you may, in the center of the room, do whatever you like with the pastes you find there, up to and including lobbing it at other classmates. The caveat is that this is an opt-out activity. You will all have three minutes to decide if you want to be in the center of the classroom or on the perimeter. After three minutes, if you are still in the center of the room, it will be seen as tacit permission to engage in paste-lobbing with your fellow classmates. Students on the perimeter must be left alone.

”At any point you may choose to go from perimeter to center of the classroom or from center of classroom to perimeter in order to experience different pastes. Please keep in mind that while this is meant to be fun, you are also meant to be observing the pastes, and you will be expected to write up your observations for homework.”

Paras checked his watch and then said, ”You’ll know the three minutes are up because the chairs will disappear from the center of the room, leaving just the pastes behind in large quantities. If you are staying in the center of the room, please do not touch the pastes until the chairs disappear. Time begins now.”

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OOC Note: The “pastes” on the perimeter of the room range from the thickness/consistency to that of mud to that of sand and Play-Doh. He chose ones that would not have chemical reactions with each other and would not be dangerous if they touched an orifice. So you could go draw designs in a thin paste or make mustaches for your charrie out of the medium ones or build stuff with the thick ones. Feel free to assume there is [i]plenty of everything (I’m thinking an entire classroom table covered with each type of substance).

The pastes in the middle of the room are thinner, so you’re not going to get play-doh-thick stuff lobbed at your character--more like frothy soap and shaving cream and mud thicknesses/consistencies. Again, stuff that wouldn’t sting too bad if it got into an eye, and stuff that won’t react. There will be a LOT of it--like, piles and piles of each kind.

Feel free to have stuff be whatever color/stickiness/etc you want within those parameters.

As always, do not reply to this thread--instead, either start a new thread or reply to someone else's thread within this forum.

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